Presentation to Transportation Librarians

Slide 1
Eileen Boswell
Information Specialist
Community Transportation Association of
America
MSLIS Candidate
The Catholic University of America
Washington, DC

Presentation to
Transportation Librarians
Roundtable
February 12, 2009

Slide 2
Introduction
• Duties at CTAA:
• Manage incoming print resources (from TRB,
FTA, our members and others)
• Coordinate outgoing resource alerts
• Do research to support our Technical
Assistance specialists
• Support for magazines we publish (RAIL and
Community Transportation)
• Lead developer on new website for National
Resource Center for Human Service
Transportation Coordination
• Special interest in web accessibility

Slide 3
What skills and theories are being
taught at your library school?
• Generalist track
• Four core courses (Info. Organization, Systems,
Services, Libraries and Information in Society)
• Electives: Marketing, Copyright, Special
Libraries, Digital Libraries, History of the Book,
and Cataloging
• Common themes seem to be:
• improving access to information for all users
• the role of libraries in the age of the Internet
• knowing and applying the core processes and values of librarianship in any context

Slide 4
What were your expectations of
the transportation library
community?
I had no idea there would be other transportation
librarians, or such resourceful networks
I am very grateful for being welcomed into this
community and feeling that there are people I
can ask for help and guidance

Slide 5
What recommendations do you
have?
Keep doing what you’re doing
Be inclusive
Reach out to solos

Slide 6
What are the library and
information communities
transportation libraries need to
pay attention to?
SLA
TRB (Barbara and Jessica taught me everything I
know!)
Web accessibility and Web 2.0!
Blogosphere*

Slide 7
Reserve Questions
Where do you see yourself and our community in
five years?
• Me - Still at CTAA or in a PhD program
• Us - Still intact, cohesive and resourceful
If you could change one thing in transportation
libraries right now, what would it be and why?
• A map that shows where each librarian is that
has a link to that person’s personal profile
(Facebook/LinkedIn) and his/her library